Murder at the Castle by Jeanne M. Dams Read Free Book Online

then.’
    â€˜Maybe they stopped somewhere, for gas or something.’
    â€˜In this country it’s petrol, and I doubt it. I think we’re in the wrong place. I don’t see anyone carrying instruments or the like.’
    Woops! He was definitely getting a bit snappish. He very, very seldom corrects my English.
    â€˜Oh, dear. I suppose they didn’t actually say the rehearsal was at the castle, did they? We just assumed. But look, Alan, what does it matter? I’ve heard about Welsh castles all my life, and this looks like a marvellous one. I like this better, to tell the truth. We can wander around at leisure with no rehearsal going on. We’ll hear all the music later, anyway.’
    â€˜Are you trying to chivvy me into a better mood, wench?’
    I grinned at him. ‘Worked, didn’t it? Let’s buy tickets and a guidebook.’
    Signs posted at the entrance informed us that the castle would be closed to visitors the following week, because of ‘The First Annual North Wales Music Festival’. I always think it’s pushing one’s luck to call something the ‘First Annual’, because who knows what the future will bring? I kept my thoughts to myself and silently wished them all the best of British luck.
    I had never seen a castle – a real castle – before. I had visited ruins, quite incomplete, but this was so complete as to make it almost possible to visualize it in its glory days. It still had a moat, though now water lilies and swans prettied it up and made it possible for one to forget its defensive purpose. The portcullis was long gone, but the slit through which it descended was still there.
    The guidebook explained the elaborate, multiple systems of defence. Outer bailey, inner bailey, walkways on the outer walls, towers, arrow slits . . .
    â€˜Good heavens!’ I said when I had absorbed some of the basics. ‘The remarkable thing is that the defences were ever breached. I would have thought this place would be safe from anything except aerial attack.’
    â€˜And siege. Don’t forget siege. If no one could get in, neither could anyone get out if the place was surrounded. An attacking force could starve them out.’
    â€˜But if they were prepared for a siege, with food stored away and a source of water . . .’ I studied the plan of the castle provided in the guidebook. ‘And look! There was a well, right there.’ I pointed.
    â€˜You’re right, to a degree. But there were forms of aerial attack, you know. No aircraft, but a good catapult could fling a fair-sized boulder over the walls, and then there were flaming arrows and the like.’
    I shuddered. ‘The capacity of man to invent diabolical instruments of destruction hasn’t changed much over the years, has it? The technology is different today, but the will to annihilate is the same. Let’s talk about something else. Did people actually live in this place? Those stone walls couldn’t have done much to keep out the cold and damp.’
    â€˜There were fireplaces,’ said Alan. ‘See those recesses in the walls, there, and there? And of course the lord of the castle would have had furnishings to make his household at least minimally comfortable. Cushions, hangings to keep out drafts, shutters for the windows and later even glass. We might not have found it ideal, but they didn’t do so badly for themselves. Shall we wander on?’
    â€˜Sure. I want to see the chapel.’
    There was an arrow pointing the way, up a steep and narrow stairway edging a wall. I was willing to bet it had not had a railing back when the castle was in daily use, and was profoundly grateful that it had one now, especially since it leaned noticeably outward.
    It led us to a narrow interior passage lit mostly by widely spaced arrow slits. Oh, there was an occasional electric light, but not enough to make me happy. I fought to stave off claustrophobic